Does God Re-Gift?

The Blessing of Pain’s Work, Part II

Gift giving season is upon us. This is my FAVORITE time of year! My children are under the same roof, lots of fun food, movies, laughter, presents and TIME. Just to have time as a family is sacred and precious to me.

Then there are Christmas parties with fun, food, laughter, and the inevitable elephant gift game. I’m always looking through my house for an old, unopened gift that was passed on to me at another party. I was pondering such things when the Lord clearly said, “I re-gift”.

He had my attention. “You? Re-gift? What could you possibly re-gift, Lord, “ I asked.

“Your past,” He answered.

I don’t know about anyone else, but my past has some painful stuff in it and I would NOT want to open it again. Instead of visions of sugar plums dancing in my head, I had visions of me sitting at His Christmas tree with great anticipation as He hands me a beautiful silver-papered box with white tulle. I rip it open and look into His eyes with excitement as I tear open the box…only to see molestation. Shocked and confused, I grab another beautifully wrapped gift; this one has red shiny paper and a big white bow - betrayal.

This isn’t how I envision God’s gifts to me.

So I asked, “What do you mean by that Lord?”

He responded, “I give my children the gift of their past through My eyes and My perspective…if they are willing to accept it.” Ah, there it is…the caveat that we hear from our Lord so often - if they are willing to accept it. I reflected on what the Lord has brought me through. The last four years have been filled with naval staring, crying, reflection, therapy, more naval staring, and one thing I definitely have now is a new perspective.

I couldn’t tell anyone why the Lord allowed me to walk my walk, but one thing I can tell is the more I give Him burdens, hurts, pain, heartache, betrayal and my past mistakes, the more He teaches me about myself and about Him. I see parts of myself I never saw before. Gifts, hopes, dreams and wisdom gained and learned from my past - they are all there wrapped in beautiful, Holy paper - if I want to unwrap it.

So now when I unwrap my past I see it through His eyes and His perspective. In my beautifully wrapped past I see re-gifted molestation that looks a lot like a deep compassion and understanding about how one wounded person can wound another. In the re-gifted betrayal, I see redemption and deep understanding of forgiveness.  I now understand how to love a betrayer through my Savior’s heart. I see beautiful things rising out of the ashes that could not have grown without my past to fertilize and nurture it. I have compassion, understanding, and wisdom that I never had without my history reflected in His perspective.

So yes, God re-gifts. Are you willing to open it?

The Gift of Pain, Part I

To everything there is a season. A time for every purpose under heaven…Ecclesiastes 3:1

Christmas is coming. Have you noticed it arrives quicker every year? I remember as a kid the anxious anticipation of gazing at my packages under the tree and keeping my hands in my robe pockets for fear they would find their way to the ribbon before breakfast. That was a hard and fast rule in our house. Absolutely NO opening packages until we’d had breakfast.

Before I was able to figure out a gift by its shape and the way it rattled, I would tear into each one thinking “this is the gift I asked for,” or “I bet this is the toy I wanted.” Then with great disappointment, I found socks - or my personal favorite - underwear. I didn’t care that it was practical. I didn’t care that I needed it. It wasn’t what I’d wanted or hoped for.

Pain is a lot like that. It isn’t what we want. It isn’t what we’d hoped for. But it is sometimes necessary.

And it is a gift.

I had a teacher in middle school I never liked, Mr. Fowler. He was old, grumpy, he never smiled, and he wore a bow tie. Yes…a bow tie. Every day. He was my math teacher so it was a subject I already hated, so Mr. Fowler made it more…hateful. But he was a patient, long-suffering instructor. He would work with me until I understood. He wanted me to untangle a problem, understand, and learn. Mr. Fowler was a gift to a little girl that didn’t understand math.

Pain is like that. We hate it. We don’t want it. We try to run from it. But pain, like Mr. Fowler, is a perfect instructor. There are many examples in the Word of our Father using pain to instruct His children and not because He is mean or grumpy. Sometimes our own disobedience or a bad choice brings it on, or even situations we have no part in, like the death of a loved one or a job lay-off.

Whatever the circumstance, pain is an unwelcome friend and an effective instructor enclosed in a package we must unwrap sometimes. Why? 

Because it brings correction when needed, direction when sought, focus and clarity when pressed into; It gets our attention, and that is just the beginning.

Boundaries and Bridges

This has been a brutal two weeks for me. I lost the man I called dad for 25 years. I wasn’t ready. I didn’t realize how much I’d missed his spiritual and fatherly influence in my life over the last four years until he was no longer here. I hadn’t spoken to him since before my divorce was final - we had both built a boundary of pain and grief around our hearts.

A month ago, that boundary was torn down by a chance FaceTime chat between my daughter, son and I. My daughter was visiting her grandparents and she put them on the screen. It was awkward at first - kind of like trying to remember how to speak a language you hadn’t spoken in a long time. Eventually words came, and it was as if bricks of time and pain didn’t exist.  I had the gift of moments’ with him to tell him I missed him, loved him, and prayed for him.

That was the last time I spoke to him. The last time I got to share my love for him. Our boundary was torn down and a bridge was built. Pain and tears was the wood and nails, but the bridge was finished and I am so grateful. He had ceased to be my father-in-law, but became my father-in-heart instead.  

During the myriad of family plans and funeral arrangements, I had another ‘gift of moments’ to talk to my former husband on the phone and express my grief and pain at our mutual loss. After four long years, we were on common ground with shared pain. The Lord birthed a sweet Agape-covenant-love with him during those conversations. There was no pain from decades of heartache. No anger, no hostility; only sweet Christ-centered, compassion, love and care for the man who’d granted me two of the greatest gifts I’d ever received - our children.

That was when I knew a perfect miracle had happened. When I could look past decades-old heartache, anger, betrayal, and pain and all I saw was love, care, compassion. There was a genuine desire to be an ambassador of healing and encouragement.

God is good.

At the same time in unrelated circumstances, I also had the opportunity to build a healthy boundary for my heart. Using pain and shed tears I had to build a boundary between myself and another – not because of betrayal, anger, or offense – but out of self-honor and self-love.

Boundaries and Bridges - both built with pain and tears. Boundaries provide safety. Bridges provide a path for reconciliation. 

Pain, tears, words, and time are worthy tools in the Master’s Hands.

The Orphan Heart

A few months ago I was privileged to take part in a spiritual deep healing retreat. I’d been to the retreat before and went as a spiritual “tune up” following a painful and challenging season. I really didn’t expect to get anything in particular out of it. It was just, you know…a tune up.

The tears started as they described the Orphan Heart. According to the retreat leader those with an orphan heart believe they are alone and do not belong. They believe they have to take care of themselves and their survival depends on their own efforts. ¹

The tears didn’t make sense to me as I never considered myself an orphan nor did I ever really believe I was alone. Apparently the Holy Spirit knows otherwise.

It all started with Adam and Eve. They abandoned God through their disobedience. They were afraid, were shamed because of their nakedness, and took control of their circumstances by hiding. They truly believed, because of their sin, they were without any help or support and had to take care of themselves.

Sound familiar?

Those with an orphan heart believe their survival depends on his or her own efforts, they don’t need anyone, and that it is not safe to be submitted to another. I still didn’t see where a wound came into my heart until they said ‘it wasn’t safe to be submitted to another.”

I’d been submitted to a father who molested me. I’d been submitted to a husband that lied. I’d been submitted to church leadership who told me there was nothing they could do to help me and that I had to be submitted and obedient to a husband who led a deceitful lifestyle.

The wringing began deep in my spirit and like a water-soaked towel, the Holy Spirit gently wrung out all the pain, fear, loneliness and even independence upon self - and the tears flowed.

How many of us are trapped by the enemy with this thinking? Trapped by a bondage that is so deep and engrained they can’t see that we are created to love, bond, and need one another and that WE ARE ACCEPTED just as we are.

Those with an orphan heart:

·         See God as a Master, not as a Father.

·         Feel like an outsider, not belonging to a family.

·         Strive to be accepted by others or a people pleaser, rather than just resting in their Abba’s arms.

·         Believe they have to earn God’s favor, rather than just delight in pleasing Him.

·         “Must” be pure and holy to have His approval, instead of wanting to be these things for Him.

·         Look to counterfeit sources (i.e. addictions or escapism) rather than find comfort in an Abba’s love and presence.

…and so many more.

Today, I lost a man whom I was privileged to call Dad for 25 years. He was the only healthy father I knew and he had a great impact on my life and gave my children an amazing spiritual legacy. All those orphan feelings rose again, but I had to remind myself:  It is written, “For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by Him we cry, “Abba Father.” Romans 8:15

We are no longer orphans. We are sons and daughters of the most high – and we need to remind the enemy of this.

¹Taken from The Cleansing Stream Retreat booklet. 

What is in a Name?

Throughout the last decade and a half the Lord has littered my journey with Him with nuggets of teaching about names and why He changes them. Have you ever noticed that? One minute we are reading about Abram, then the next Abraham. Jacob was renamed Israel.

Did you ever wonder why?

I went through two major times of internal healing –the first was from sexual abuse with my dad; the second, a separation and divorce.  On each occasion the Lord told me, “I will change your name, daughter.” When I asked Him why, He reminded me that throughout my growing up years I was embarrassed to be known as my father’s daughter because of his behavior in public while intoxicated. I would cringe inside when people said,” You are Jack’s daughter.”  When I confirmed yes, I saw the look in their eye. I saw the looks behind my father’s back when he, in a drunken stupor, would be belligerent or lascivious to  friends. I quickly learned that being his daughter was something to be ashamed of.

So when my Abba told me He was changing my name, I was excited, but I didn’t understand what that meant. Then he brought me to Genesis 32 where Jacob wrestled with God and He changed his name to Israel. The Lord said…

“But he had to wrestle for it.”

Oh. Well that didn’t sound as inviting as before. Couldn’t I just get some sort of spiritual birth certificate? What about a Christening party…I liked parties.

Nope. Wrestling.

“But Lord,” I whined, “I don’t know how to wrestle!”

He showed me.

Like Jacob, I had to give up my right to fear, vengeance, hurt, and betrayal just to name a few. In other words, I had to give up my right to my past. You can’t take a new name into a new future with the past hanging on to you like an albatross.

The Israelites had it right. They understood the power behind a name. They knew that a name was an actual spiritual blessing and it meant there was power imparted through a God-given name. Some even believed that names influenced the thoughts and beliefs about themselves and that the name prophesied characteristics or roles they would play in history. ¹

I thought once I had my new name that was “it”, that I’d arrived. That was when the Great Name Giver showed me that, in order to pass through the wilderness into your promised land, you have many wrestling’s and many name changes along the way. Every time you have a major shift or transition in your life’s journey, He may take you through a season of wrestling for a new name.

I’ve grown to like wrestling. Don’t get me wrong. It’s hard. It hurts. I have likened it to peeling off skin over an exposed bone.

Kind of like shedding…only deeper.

I will change your name
You shall no longer be called
Wounded, outcast, lonely or afraid

I will change your name
Your new name shall be
Confidence, joyfulness, overcoming one
Faithfulness, friend of God
One who seeks My face

Eden’s Bridge

¹ http://www.gotquestions.org/name-change.ht

A Missed Opportunity with Destiny?

Disappointment – it litters our lives with potholes. Have you noticed that?

The class you thought you did so well in only to find out that the last test put your grade down a whole letter – pothole.

The job promotion you’d thought you had, only to hear to you didn’t get it – pothole.

A special someone, whom you hoped shared your feelings, only to find out they didn’t – pothole.

Potholes aren’t fatal, but they sure can create pain, frustration, even heartache. Just like stepping into a physical pothole, journey-potholes can cause broken dreams, sprained plans, and misaligned focus.

See – not fatal. Just painful.

Here we thought we had an appointment with destiny; a new career path, a new heart path, a better grade and cheaper car insurance. But our appointment with our planned destiny never happens.

It isn’t fatal, but it’s painful.

Missed appointments are scattered throughout the Bible. Moses had a missed appointment with the promised land. His journey was filled with potholes creating mounting frustration. Eventually, in a fit of frustration and anger, he struck a rock and altered the course of his destiny. Instead of Moses bringing the children of Israel into the promised land, HE entered the Promise Land.

Then there is Joseph, remember him? Left in prison to rot, he thought he had an appointment with favor and destiny, only to be forgotten by a fellow prisoner. He waited, disappointed, thinking he’d been forgotten by the One he served. Eventually, when God’s appointed time came, Joseph was remembered and favor paved the way to his destiny.

David a shepherd boy and poet thought he would take the throne without any loopholes; favor waved like banners around this young boy. Instead, he spent years running for his life from the very man he loved and promised to serve. You could say he dealt with disappointment. But David’s perceived missed appointment groomed him to be a great king.

Disappointments can shape our destiny. So the next time you step into a pothole of disappointment, keep your eyes on the author and finisher of your life. Your journey to your destiny is about to change.

The Wilderness, the Red Shirt, and the Cave

Here’s a riddle: What do the wilderness, a red shirt, and a cave have in common?

At first glance very little; however, to a wilderness wanderer, quite a bit.

After spending 18 years drifting in a spiritual and emotional desert, I found a lovely cave to nest in. Dark, warm, and safe, my emotional and spiritual cave became a recovery zone of sorts. It gave me a beautiful solitude and territorial solidarity to serve as my rehab center. Safe from prying eyes and probing legalistic religiosity, I learned of and leaned into a deep, precious sense of the unmerited, unwavering grace of my Abba.

But even rehab needs to end. Most people are anxious to get out of rehab. I guess I’m not most people. I knew what awaited me outside – more dusty, erred wilderness. Yet in His infinite wisdom my Lord knew what would get me back on the road out of my wasteland.

Forgiving Him.

I have been in the church long enough to have been the perpetrator and the victim of someone Bible thumping the message of forgiveness:

“”If you don’t…God won’t forgive you.”

“If you don’t…you could lose your salvation.”

“If you don’t…”

But even though the Lord knew I needed to forgive Him for, in my mind, abandoning me, do you know how He handled it?

He waited with open arms.

He didn’t thump His Word. He didn’t point a finger. He didn’t lament with stern expressions. He waited with open arms. And so a few weeks ago, I ran into His arms with abandon and found myself on the very short path out of my wasteland.

In football there is a term known as a “red shirt.” Players that wore the red shirt were a part of the team; however, due to injury or illness, were forced to sit out during convalescing. The red shirt was a sign to others that this player is still a valued member of the team; however, they needed to be out a season to heal.

After guiding me out of the wilderness, the Lord handed me back my team jersey, lovingly slapped me on the back, and put me back in the game.

Wanderlust or Just Wandering, Part III

I didn’t realize these offended thoughts toward my Lord - seeds as it were – could find fertile soil within the barren arid ground of my spirit. But they did. Offended thought-seeds can germinate anywhere, especially when the enemy waters and fertilizes it with verbiage from his bag of tricks.

These offense seeds are like cancer cells are to our body. They start small and replicate when the environment is out of alignment. Pretty soon illness takes over, but because the malignant seeds are well-hidden from view by this point, you can’t see the forest from the trees. For 18 years I didn’t see where the originating offense came from because I was too busy blaming everyone or everything else. 

Since this divine revelation of my offense with the One that died for me, I’ve asked Him and myself, “Why did it take me 18 years to get it?” Am I that dense?

The Lord brought me to a devotional from Oswald Chambers that put it in perspective:

Our Lord does not hide these things; they are unbearable until we get into a fit condition of spiritual life. There must be communion with His risen life before a particular word can be borne by us.” *

I have been communing more with my naval than His risen life. My hurt, pain, and betrayal were far more palpable than who Jesus was in my circumstances. How sad. I have spent the better part of 38 years walking with the Lord, but not connecting with who He is. My only measuring stick was what He’d done for me – but that was not enough to keep offense from multiplying and dividing like an insidious diseased cell.

The cry of my heart now is the see Him; the kind of seeing as when you can’t take your eyes off the object of your affections. The kind of seeing and knowing that sees past the “doing”, past the flesh and soul.

The kind that sees His heart.

*My Utmost for His Highest, Oswald Chambers

Wanderlust or Just Wandering, Part II - Shaken not Stirred

Offense is a funny thing. Sometimes it sneaks up on you like a cat ready to pounce on its prey; sometimes it is disguised with self-righteousness or blanketed with irritation so you don’t recognize it.

The Lord spent 18 years shaking my foundations to see what remained. Thankfully, very little; but like a California earthquake, I have been tossed and shaken until all I see is rubble. And it was necessary.

There are those that would claim it was the enemy as God doesn't cause earthquakes or catastrophes.

Really?

What about Sodom and Gomorrah?

What about the idolatrous Israelites in the wilderness?

What about David losing his son? Or Peter denying his Lord? Both were shaken to their very core.  Why?

Because God can’t build on a faulty foundation. God’s version of shaking brings down works of the flesh so that only the Spirit remains. Still not convinced? Here are just some of the benefits of shaking:

·         It reveals what our foundation is made of and brings us closer to it.

·         It awakens us.

·         It removes what is dead or useless.

·         Weakness and breaking points are revealed.

So yes, shaking is necessary, and yes shaking is Holy. And by the Grace of God, it will be used to rebuild upon a rock.

Wanderlust, or Just Wandering, Part I

And then many would be offended… Matthew 24:10

I have had many opportunities to be offended in my 51 years: husband, friends, co-workers, bosses, even my parents! Throughout all, I’ve been able to work through my offense – some easier than others – and get back on the road of life merrily on my way.

Yet, unknowing, I have spent the last eighteen years wandering in an erred spiritual desert. Eighteen long years of shuffling my spiritual, dusty feet looking for my lost destiny. Those who know me well, know I have lost many ministry dreams due to another’s decisions.

My heart bled with each loss and I had to work through the pain of my partner’s betrayals, loss of friendships, and loss of dreams. Each time I had to walk the well-traveled path of forgiveness for the offenses, then wait and pray for another dream, another opportunity to serve.

I learned and grew so much during these refining times - until “that day.” I don’t even know what day it was; but something deep died one day and it’s been dead ever since.

On the outside all looked healed, but in my spirit something – a ubiquitous dark place – took up shop unnoticed.

Offense.

Not with a friend, partner, ministry or church, not with family or a co-worker.

I was offended with Jesus.

To the broken heart of a little girl, my Savior, Healer, Father, and Protector did not pick up a sword and fight for my destiny. In this little girl’s heart, she was left bleeding and bruised on the side of the road blaming everyone involved – yet nursing the smallest seed of thought, “Where was my Jesus when I lost my dream? Where was Jesus when I lost my friends? Where was Jesus when His church ignored me because of their offense with my partner’s sin?”

He was standing next to me weeping.

Yet I couldn't feel or see it through my slow-growing, permeating cancerous cell of offense. It took Him eighteen years to open my eyes and heart to the truth. The church, ministry, ex-husband, or Jesus was not responsible for my eighteen-year desert wandering.

I was.

From Enable to Able

One of the hardest titles for me to shed is enabler. It is ingrained into my personality like a strand of DNA. Being raised with an alcoholic, enabling in one way or another became a survival technique.

Where was Al Anon when I was 13!

“At the heart of every enabler is someone with a low sense of self-worth,” according to Angelyn Miller, MA (The Enabler, 1988).

The impostor in me rises in indignation! Me have a low sense of self-worth? Confident, outgoing, loves the spotlight…me?

Yes. Me.

What a surprise revelation that my need to enable someone else’s dysfunctional pattern or addiction points right back at me. It seems rewarding to help people with their problems, so fulfilling to pick up someone else’s burden or dysfunction and help (i.e. enable) them to continue in their self-imposed pattern of implosion.

No wonder I get so tired! This is one title I long to shed like itchy, scaly skin. I wish it were so easy.

What would happen if my friends exercised for me? Lifted weights for me? Or better yet, what if they did my push ups and crunches? The sugar I so love to eat would find a final resting place on my thighs, my friends would grow stronger, and I would grow weak and ill.

This flaking, crusty title must be shed one wise decision at a time. It is so much easier to remain an enabler than reflect the Able one. It is a long, sometimes painful process to shape our character to the one we strive to reflect. But oh how I long to resemble my First Love. The Able One.

Starving Writer's Imagination Seeks Audience of One

Is your imagination starved? I know mine is. Does your imagination look towards the heavens or at an idol? By idol, I mean work, leisure time, your spouse, yourself.

I’ve come to the harsh reality that my imagination is starving to death. Oh it is active enough! The writer’s imagination is never silent or stoic. It skips rapidly from one creative rock to another along the stream of life.

That isn’t my problem. My starvation comes from what the said stream retains.

The children of Israel starved their imagination by looking upon the face of idols. Isaiah, in his wisdom, reminded them to look to the heavens. Nature is God’s creative autograph of His Glory and Power.

"Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
    Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
    and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
    not one of them is missing." Isaiah 40:26 NIV

Our ability to imagine is limitless. Why then - and I speak to myself – do we limit God?

Oswald Chambers wrote, “Imagination is the power God gives a saint to position himself out of himself into relationships he never was in.” 1

With recent fussing and fidgeting before God, it came to me with surprising clarity how small I have made my Lord. I minimize my creator in so many ways. Doubting His love, doubting His presence, worrying about that medical bill and how it will get paid, choosing to act without clear direction because I think He’s late, or… helping my sacrifice off the alter because I don’t see it’s replacement in a thicket.

Since childhood my imagination has been my friend, confidant, therapist, and cheap entertainment. Upon a moment’s notice from boredom, stress, or trauma, my imagination has been at the ready and available. It is infinitely easier to slay imaginary dragons, take down enemies, and fall in love in my imagination.

But it has also been my undoing. A two-edged sword.

Like the Israelites, I have let my perception of God and His attentiveness in my life be dictated by what I imagine Him to be – not experiencing who He is.

As I shed what this world has taught me about myself, I long to see my creator and myself not through the eyes of my imagination, but through the eyes of Truth and clarity.

^“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate^[a] the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV

¹ My Utmost for His Highest

Sacrificial Ashes

What happens when we take our sacrifice off the alter when God tells us to leave it there?

When God always calls us to place what we treasure on the alter, is it to see if we love Him enough? Is it to test us? I don’t know. I know for me, it was to see if my obedience outweighed what my heart desired.

I failed miserably.

I tied my treasure to the alter and waited like all obedient children do. Then, as time ticked on, my sacrifice’s replacement (i.e. ram) didn’t show. Where was my ram in the thicket? I looked and looked. Surely the Lord would provide a replacement for my treasure!

Not finding one, I felt it necessary – nay my duty – to untie my treasure and help it off the alter. Then the Lord asked, “Where is your sacrifice?” With a shameful shuffle, I tied it back up (loosely mind you, you never know when you might need it), stepped back in pious religiosity, then went on the hunt for its replacement yet again.

With each pious conviction and rebinding, the sacrifice ropes became looser and looser until eventually the treasure slipped off the alter unaided. I kept waiting for Him to allow me to keep my sacrifice, all the while He kept waiting for me to allow Him to keep it.

God is quite patient with our humanity, but there will come that fateful day when, before you can untie it again, He sends Holy Fire to consume the sacrifice He chose for YOU to offer.

It is agonizing to watch a treasure you have longed for burn. The fire is Holy and from His heart, but it still sears your being.

My soul wailed at the site of my incinerated treasure.

But Lord – you didn’t send a ram, what was I to do?

Wait. That is what you do. You wait.

My beautiful treasure – one I’d waited many years for – lay in ashes at the alter because I couldn’t – wouldn’t – wait for my ram.

So what is one to do when their treasure lay at God’s alter in ashes?

Wait ...

... for the ashes to soak into the soil during the spring rains.

... for the ashes to feed future seeds.

Wait ... with thanksgiving and praise to see the peaceable fruit of righteousness rise from the ash-sodden soil.

Label Maker

I’ve never been one to buy according to a label.  If there is a comparable item at a lower price, then I consider it a deal.  But the Pharisee within me doesn’t buy the deal. The Pharisee only sees through the eyes of a label.

When it comes to humanity:

Labels = Impressions

Impressions = ideas

Ideas = prejudices

I would have hoped that my years in ministry would have peeled this from my inner sanctum, but no.  My religiosity has created so many new labels to slap on some unfortunate soul.  When I see an obese person, I slap on the label “glutton”. When I see an overweight individual -  “lazy”. When I see someone wearing dirty clothing or unwashed hair -  “unclean”.  When I witness a frustrated mother and a loud child arguing - ”undisciplined.”

My inner label maker is quick to the draw too. Within a nano-second, I can label just about anyone that walks by.

In my job I am constantly organizing something that needs files. In order to know what is in the file, I slap a label on it. Every time I see that file, I know what it contains.

So convenient.

So organized.

So unfair to humanity.

Jesus was the incarnate Heart of God toward humanity and if Jesus truly owns my heart than why do I do this?

If, as the Word says, I am turned or changed into the same I reflect, why am I not reflecting Christ instead of pasting labels? “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 3:18)

Because instead of my mind and heart being riveted on the Risen Christ and how He sees people, I am consumed with how they appear to me.

And thus…how I appear to them.

Brennan Manning wrote, “Contemplative awareness of the risen Jesus shapes our resemblance to Him and turns us into the persons God intended us to be.” Abba’s Child.

I guess if I contemplated my Jesus more, I would reflect Him more. If I reflect Him more, I will see as He sees. If we Christians contemplated Christ as much as we contemplate our navel, or one another, we would see as He sees.

Besides contemplating my navel makes a crick in my neck.